Wednesday, August 14

Ethan and Grandpa Bill, July 1st

After an intermission of several months caused by sciatica and gardening, I am resuming my blog with a summer newsletter.

My first posting is about the weather. What a bore.... To sum it up, it rains, and rains and rains. Worse than a bad summer in England.....

Some much better news:

Two more grandchildren on the way!

Martin and his partner Jamie are expecting a little girl in November, and are pleased about it. They are living in Sudbury, Ontario and Martin is on a job-training program which he is very enthusiastic about. Bill is visiting them at present.

Aidan and his partner Nikki are expecting a baby in February and are both thrilled to bits. They are living in Pine Hill Quebec and Aidan, in addition to his music has a full-time job working for a large family-run maple syrup/dairy operation, which he enjoys very much. Nikki will be working on the creative part of her Masters Degree in Fibre Arts this year. Knitting is not one of her specialties, but she is going to start...

..... and I will have to get going, firstly finishing a complicated sweater for Ethan featuring a red International tractor on his tummy.

And Bill will get going on his real tractor, landscaping our grounds and working on his firewood business.

Monday, April 21

Few birds here today, apart from a tragedy which occurred at lunchtime. There was a loud crash, as if a truck had driven into the side of the house. Turned out to be Billy Partridge meeting his end, by hitting the office window and breaking his back.

Bill had him skinned and soaking in brine in no time, ready for the pot.

Sunday, April 20

Another pair of birds, and very beautiful ones at that. A white-throated sparrow, which has bright yellow stripes on his head, and his wife ate their fill at the feeder. It would be nice if they built a nest here, but expect they will move on.

Saturday, April 19

Today it was pine grosbeaks -- a truly beautiful bird, with a pale pink body.

And the distinctive cry of the Eastern phoebe woke us up early this morning:

Friday, April 18

The finches are leaving, heading up north to breed, and Spring is bringing new arrivals every day. Robins, Red-winged blackbirds, starlings and sparrows are all reappearing.

Insteead of flocks of birds, we seem to have couples instead. Today a male and female cowbird spent some time at the feeder. Now cowbirds prefer to put their fledglings up for adoption, rather like cukoos, -- and this is not voluntary on the part of the adoptive parents, in fact their own brood usually dies off -- or is pushed out of the nest by the intruder.

The couple at our feeder were not at all aggressive, as Bill pointed out they had obviously been taught good manners by the birds who brought them up. And close up they made a fine pair.

Saturday, April 12

Another nasty day, with rain to start and snow to follow. The Ottawa Citizen published a summary of this winter's extraordinary winter, entitled Winter: Misery from end to end. Apparently we are suffering from low energy, mild depression and anxiety created by the challenges of getting about without falling down and breaking something.

We are also approaching the record snowfall experienced in 1970-71 -- 444.1 cm of snow. All the more remarkable as recent winters have been milder, as expected due to climate change starting to have an impact. Apparently this blip is due to the lingering effects of La Nina, a weather phenomenen that creates lower than normal sea temperatures in the Pacific Ocean.

Some snowy data:
Snow fallen up to April 10 --436.3 cm
Average snowfall in the 1970s -- 266 cm
Average snowfall in the past ten years -- -216 cm
Snow removed by the City of Ottawa -- 4 million cubic metres
Budget for snow removal in 2008 -- $65 million
Revised budget including the rest of the year -- $88 million

Snowiest day in so far in 2008 -- March 8, when 33.6 cm fell -- and I was in England picking daffodills and enjoying the flowering almonds and magnolia blossoms as well as green grass!

Friday, April 11

Bill's birthday and he had the best of presents -- a clean bill of health from Doctor Turner. A happy day, in spite of icy relentless rain all day and all night. A pancake breakfast on the house at Temple's Sugar Camp Restaurant, and dinner at the Fall River Pub made the trips out into the elements worthwhile. And the snow is going fast -- filling up ditches, low-lying fields, and over-flowing river banks and lakes.

At the beginning of the week, the picnic table by the washing line was completely covered -- today it is on bare ground. Soon be able to hang out washing!







The birds are coming back from the South, and our feeders are attracting them. The redpolls are still here, but their colour is changing and the males are getting more aggressive -- diving at one another to knock the females off the perches on the feeder. Chickadees are as cheerful and busy as ever, and the nuthatches are still around. We can hear -- and see -- woodpeckers tapping away at the maple trees, and today a flock of juncoes arrived. They like to stay on the ground, pecking for food on the lawn, instead of at the feeder. They have, however, discovered the seeds knocked off the feeders by greedy birds and annoying squirrels, and are doing a good job of tidying up the deck.

All week, maple sap was boiling down to sweet syrup, but the warm spell stopped the flow. It is not flowing during the present cold snap -- but we do need it as the sap will now be able to flow again when it warms up again.

Thursday, April 10

Another glorious day, and we gather up at MERA to cut withies from the willow labyrinthe. At first, the rows of upright, lyellowy -brown woody shoots, waving gently in the wind, seem endless -- how will we ever finish the task we are starting?

Eight women working - bending, chopping, sorting, chatting, bundling, tying-- the afternoon soon goes by productively and soon we are ready for next week's basket making.

Every day when I was a teenager in England, I puffed along in a steam train to Bishop Fox's Girl's School across the Somerset Levels. Withy production on the green, wet, soggy and often flooded levels was in decline as plastic and nylon were starting to intrude on tradtional fibres and fabrics. Arts such as thatching, weaving and spinning were in decline --and thought to be on the way to extinction. But no, here we are in 2008 with young and old learning, or returning, to what are now referred to as "heritage arts". And feeling a sense of accomplishment light years from coming home with a plastic bag of "stuff" from Walmart.

Tuesday, April 6

sun is shining
snow is melting
sap is boiling

spring is coming
birds are twittering
I'm sitting on my porch.

Middleton in March

After all the ice and snow, it was wonderful to land in England and see green grass and flowers.

Daffodils! Mother and Toni have been planting a few daffodils every autumn for the past forty years, and the result is that all at once you see a cloud, a host of golden daffodils.


Other plants were still in bloom -- crocii, primroses and a few flowering shrubs, but it was the daffodils that shone.






Wonderful!




Old Common as a Duck Sanctury


Oh look, the ducks are here!" "Well -- open the back door and feed them!"

I always enjoy the ducks and ducklings at Old Common, carefully watching where I step on the lawn -- good fertilizer I'm sure -- but I had not realized the rest of the village is not so enamoured of them. In fact they shoo them down towards Old Common! On my last visit a mother arrived with a freshly hatched brood of eight ducklings, and we watched them grow day by day -- with two of the less obedient and more adventurous ones disappearing to Duck Heaven. This time there were fewer around than normal and the main visitors were the Odd Couple -- an infertile female and a strangely marked male, who have been together for several years -- drawn together by their differences from the flock, but happy enough -- especially on three square meals a day.

Those Aggressive Moorhens

There are far more moorhens in the garden than a few years ago, and it is fun to see them rushing around, grabing some duck food and scurrying off to avoid the mallards going after them. But among themselves, they can be very aggressive -- I saw two males chasing a third one all over the front garden and pecking at him. This went on for a good half an hour, until one of the attackers got bored and wandered off. Mating season ahead? And trying to reduce the competition?

More to follow!

Thursday, March 13 A Tale of Snow

Aidan, my son, is following in the blended family tradition and working in the maple syrup industry this year -- a seasonal job which fits in very well with his music. He is crew boss for a large operation owned by English-speaking Quecbecers near his home. He works six days a week tramping around in 6 feet of snow putting taps in the maple trees so they are ready when the sap starts to run -- which it does when the temperature is about 0 during the day, and below freezing at night. Last Sunday, he spent his day off digging out from the last storm. And when he got home from work today, the police knocked at his door and told him to get the snow off his roof! More work, but there have been a couple of nasty incidents -- a house in Ottawa split apart at the apex of the roof and has been condemned, and the roof of a warehouse in Quebec collapsed killing three people. So it is wise to be cautious.

To round out his snowy day, the Montreal Canadiens suffered a humiliating defeat in ice hockey by the Ottawa Senators.

Better luck tomorrow, Aidan!

Go Senators Go!

Wednesday March 12

After 24 h to get over my jet lag we packed our overnight bags and headed down to Kingston. We left at 6 a.m. -- pitch black and snowing straight at the car. Roads slushy, slippery and dangerous for the first 50 km. Nearing Kingston it was lighter, warmer and the roads had been ploughed, so we got there in plenty of time for Bill's appointment at the hospital for another angiogram. A blocked artery was discovered, and two more stents put in. The surgeon gave us "before and after" photos of the area around Bill's heart -- fascinating as you can hardly see one of the arteries in the first picture, but in the second it is full of blood, as are the capilliaries around it. We also learned that one of his arteries was alreay completely blocked in 2006. "How can this be?" asked Bill. "You're alive aren't you?" was the reply...

Monday, March 10, Return to Canada

56 cm of snow to cope with? No problem! When Bill picked me up from the airport, the roads were as clean as the day they were laid down. The sun was shining and the plane arrived10 minutes early. We sped home in the extended daylight, in time to see the huge snowbanks and drive up our freshly ploughed driveway where, the day before, the snow was so deep it got into his knee-high chainsaw boots. Good to be home!

Sunday March 9, Mystery in Elphin

Tramping through the snow to the road, Chris Anstead came across a large patch of blood on the snow. No footsteps or tracks approaching or leaving. Grouse feathers everywhere, but no sign of their owner. Conclusion? Eaten by an owl.

Chris took this photo of his cat Pal observing the scenery outside the front door, and has entitled it "First Day of Daylight Saving Time". We are getting in step with the USA on this and are moving up the start of summer time to the middle of winter...

Saturday March 8

The start of a snowstorm that would dump 56 cm of snow on the city of Ottawa. Bill described the scene outside our window as a whiteout, a fog of swirling snow which made it impossible to see more than 20 m. Rare but exciting -- as long as you are safely indoors watching it, and have stocked up on groceries.

Of course the media is trying to add some excitement too. "Only 33 more to go" screams the Ottawa Citizen the following Monday, "Why not go for it? Ottawa closes in on record set in 1970-71 after mammoth storm..." Of course this record is not up to us at all but I suppose we can pray for it, if we are really daft.

There are also lots of stories about "neigbours helping neighbours" "the national spirit, honed by hardship" "stranded motorists" "warnings against straining your back/heart attacks while shovelling" "warnings against allowing your children to dig out tunnels in snow banks in case they fall in on them causing suffication (no reports of this thankfully). Oh yes, if you have to put up with all this snow, you might as well get as much drama out of it as possible.

I did enjoy it very much, from a distance of about 4000 miles.

February 26 - March 10

I spent two weeks in England's green and pleasant land, what a wonderful break from "Mon pays, c'est l'hiver". More details later.

Ethan and his Sweater

Friday, February 22

In my life --and my blog should reflect this -- I want to do more than observe birds and endless snow. My wish is for my life to be more connected with the natural world and this is why I live in the country with Bill, who takes such a way of life for granted. (Bill has read this and points out that he doesn't take it for granted -- he asks "Why do you think I'm here?")

I belong to MERA, McDonalds Corners-Elphin Recreation & Arts, and here I have met wonderful people, and am developing new skills and improving the ones I learned as a child. MERA promotes Lanark County's Heritage Arts, which was what pioneers did to survive using the materials available to them, often in highly creative and ingenious ways. This does not imply that MERA is stuck in the past -- we may make soap, but we use coconut oil, and don't render tallow from beef fat.

As a child in the 1950s, I wore beautiful smocked dresses made by my mother. Not because she was "into crafts", but because making your own clothes was a way of life. As a teenager, if I wanted a new dress, I bought some material and made it. As a mother myself I knitted for my babies, and made flowery dresses for my daughter to wear when she wasn't wearing jeans. And then I went back to work, and school, and so on.

At MERA, inspired by my Aunt Pat and encouraged by the Spinning and Knitting Group, I am learning to spin, and am improving my knitting skills. We also hold fibre-arts workshops where we get to try out something different and learn from one another. It is great to be retired!

Thursday, February 21

Last night there was a full eclipse of the moon visible between 8 pm and 11 pm. I could see it clearly out of the window, or standing on the deck. Rusy red as the earth's shadow covered the moon slowly. The stars were incredibly bright here in the country and away from light pollution. Bright stars, and a full moon. A rare sight. At one point I went to the end of the driveway, where I can see most of the sky and stood looking up at it in wonder -- until the windchill of - 26 started settling into my bones and I hurried in, slipping on the icy area round the steps and falling on my bad knee. No permanent damage..

Ever since last week's snow and rain the driveway has been a sheet of ice. Luckily a small covering of snow makes it passable -- as long as you look where you are going and are very careful. This morning when I got up about 6.30 am I could see both the setting moon and the rosy glow in the sky indicating the sun was about to rise. When Bill and went for the paper half and hour later, the moon had set in the wes and a deep red globe had risen in the east. And it is cold!

Wednesday February 20

The howling of the wolves -- which are actually coyotes. They are smaller, but can be just as mean. A natural part of the ecosystem? Or a damn nuisance? In the country the latter view often prevails. We do have wolf tracks in our driveway -- the second time we (Bill actually) has noticed them this winter. "Would he eat Ivan our cat?" "In a second" replied Bill. Scary thought, as I explained to Ivan, telling him to be careful. Fortunately he is very delicate and rarely ventures outside in winter, hating to get his paws cold or wet. Again according to Bill, once Spring comes and the coyotes can find their normal prey of small rodents with ease, they will cease hanging around human habitation. This is good.

Meanwhile, in the township of Greely -- south and east of Ottawa -- there were 400 sightings in a month of coyotes within a three-kilometre radius. Small pets were killed occasionally. "I agree, Ivan it's dreadful". According to the Ottawa Citizen, "the coyote population has now been hunted and trapped into submission, and the vast majority have moved out of the area". Nothing a rural redneck likes more than an excuse to hunt. And this is happening here. When Bill last visited the garbage dump, there were snowmobilers out there hunting wolves. So that explained why I heard snowmobiles at dawn the other day -- it seemed awfully early for recreation. Furthermore, on our way into Ottawa the other day, Bill pointed out more snowmobilers who were unloading their machines by the side of the road -- there were cages on the back of the trailer as well, containing hunting dogs.

My own view is that wolves and coyotes are an essential part of the ecosystem, helping to keep it in balance. When it comes to Ivan, my emotions take over... Get rid of them!